Health Protection

Health protection aims to protect people from infectious and environmental hazards. It includes communicable diseasesurveillance and control, the prevention and management of individual incidents or cases of communicable disease or environmental threats to health, dealing with communicable disease outbreaks or major environmental emergencies. We have responsibility for local programmes on vaccination, immunisation, and screening.

Responsibility for Port Health sits with the Director of Public Health working closely with the Shetland Islands Council Department of Environmental Health.

We provide advice within the NHS locally, and to other public sector organisations as well as to the public, and we have a 24 hour service for emergencies that threaten or harm the public health.

We work closely with the Shetland Islands Council's Environmental Health Team.

The Public Health Team can be contacted on 01595 743340 or out with office hours through the Gilbert Bain Hospital switchboard on 01595 743000.
For non-urgent queries you can also e-mail: shet.PublicHealthShetland@nhs.scot

Health Protection Advice

  • Communicable Diseases
    The local Public Health Team is contactable 24/7 for advice about communicable diseases, and should be your first route for health protection advice locally. We work closely with specialist colleagues at Health Protection Scotland.
  • Notifiable Diseases (Public Health Act 2008)
    Medical practitioners are required by law to notify certain infectious diseases to the local Health Protection Team (via telephone or SCI Gateway)
  • Exclusions from school/nursery
    If a child is unwell with an infectious disease it is advisable to keep them away from school/nursery/day care to avoid passing the infection on to other children. The following gives advice on the recommended time to be kept away:
  • Public Information
    Information about common conditions can be found on the NHS Inform website

A number of leaflets about common conditions are also available locally.